Rufus Portable 1.3.1 has been released. Rufus Portable is a USB formatting utility which also can create a bootable USB drive using a bootable ISO image. This app requires admin rights. It's packaged in PortableApps.com Format so it can easily integrate with the PortableApps.com Platform. And it's open source and completely free.

Features

Rufus is a small utility that helps format and create bootable USB flash drives, such as USB keys/pendrives, memory sticks, etc. It can be be especially useful for cases where: you need to create USB installation media from bootable ISOs (Windows, Linux, etc.); you need to work on a system that doesn't have an OS installed; you need to flash a BIOS or other firmware from DOS; you want to run a low-level utility. Rufus is significantly faster than similar utilities and it's open source and free.

PortableApps.com Installer / PortableApps.com Format

Rufus Portable is packaged in a PortableApps.com Installer so it will automatically detect an existing PortableApps.com installation when your drive is plugged in. It supports upgrades by installing right over an existing copy, preserving all settings. And it's in PortableApps.com Format, so it automatically works with the PortableApps.com Platform including the Menu and Backup Utility.

I took a quick look at the source for Rufus and in rufus.h there's this code that looks like it tries to autoupdate some Syslinux support files. Dunno if that's why you think it's "calling home" or not.